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MELBOURNE—In what is being described as a masterful maneuver in time management by Basketball Australia chief Larry Sengstock, an NBL fan plans to use the 8 minutes lost game time – a result of the change from a 48 minute game to a 40 minute game – to wait in line to buy a hot snack.

"Last season I’d leave to get hot food at half-time and I’d usually miss about 8 minutes of game time waiting in line to buy hot food," local fan Jim Garrison told the reporter at the hastily arranged news conference. "I figured if I timed my arrival to the hot food area well enough so that it overlapped with the 8 minutes of lost game time, I wouldn't miss any action. I’d be able to see the whole game!"

Basketball Australia head Larry Sengstock heralded this as yet another shining example of the benefit of the reduction to a 40 minute game, along with "a lower average number of controversial refereeing decisions per game" and "a lower average number of turnovers per game, surely indicative of a higher quality of play."